Cities through different eyes

If you could go around as a different gender for a while – like Robin Williams’ character in Mrs Doubtfire – you’d have a different experience of your city. Because they’re mainly designed and run by men, cities tend not to work so well for those who aren’t. But that’s not how it’s going to be in future.

There’s now lots more information about how cities do and don’t work for women, and slowly those who shape them (mostly men) are starting to change how they think. A few tidbits..

“A really walkable town” – pretty obvious what that means. “Bikeable town” – ditto. What about a womenable town? check out this video, or a cool document to flick through for more about womenability.

Here’s a really interesting article about research, which is mostly covering great progress we should think about emulating in NZ. But also discusses some well-meaning attempts to improve a city, that backfired for women:

Here’s a Citylab report that since Vienna’s city planners had a lightbulb moment reading people’s answers to a basic transport survey, they’ve been doing things differently. As with any progress, those who weren’t going to benefit had some eye-rolling feedback…

“People said things like, “does this mean we should paint the streets pink?”